1. Newspapers

(Radio, TV, movies)

2. How is content shaped?

3. What were new kinds of content, c. 1900? Why?

4. Focus: how larger business environment (advg) and business organization shape content

1. Mass production, distribution, marketing

2. Value of advertising: Linkage between producers, consumer.

Create demand?

3. Newspapers: Value of advertising for business.

Economics of department stores. Success = stock turn. High volume, low profit margin.

4. Role of advertising: 2/3 of revenues, power of advertiser; emergence of ad agencies.

5. Advertisers’ needs, interests: circulation, "quality" circulation, women.

6. Ad influences on newspapers: placement of ads; position; reading notices; puffs; blurring of news, ads; payola, bribery; advocacy for advertisers’ interests (substitution, labeling laws on patent medicines).

7. Advertisers and pressures on the news: suppression of news, 1896 endorsements, New York Evening Post on "Baggage Abuse."

Overview on advertising:

View of consumer

1. Income Amount, Discretionary income

2. Class

3. Geography

4. Politics

5. Religious, ethnic traditions, rules

6. Age

7. Children?

8. Hobbies

9. Gender

10. Who shops?

You are an advertising agent and need to advise a new client about the single best vehicle for his advertising. His product: a new food product called UNEEDA BISCUIT. There are three daily newspapers in your city: The Morning Democrat, circulation 100,000, Democratic; the Republican, circulation about 200,000; a Republican paper; and the Evening Independent, an independent, non-partisan newspaper of 325,000 circulation.

You know that 50 percent of the Democrat’s readers also subscribe to the Evening Independent; 60 percent of the Republican’s readers do too. Your client is leaning toward the Republican because the paper reflects his political views.

What are the options you outline for him?

Peruna. Patent medicine. Price: $3.00 (Moderate-low). Profile of consumers: middle, working classes.

Uneeda Biscuits. Food product. Price: $4.50. Profile of consumers: Middle class.

Fur coats. Clothing. Price: $3,000. Profile of consumer: Upper class.

Journal. Circulation: 1,500,000 daily, primarily street sales. Cost of advertisements: 10 cents a column inch. Demographics of readership: salaried workers, manufacturing; clerks, secretaries, service occupations (waiters, toll both workers, etc.). Price to reader: 1 cent daily.

Post. Circulation: 100,000 daily, primarily home delivery. Cost of ads: $1 per a column inch. Demographics of readership: doctors, lawyers, owners of businesses, stock brokers, architects and their families. Price to reader: 5 cents daily.

Overview: Manufacturing a new product

1. Capital investment

2. Machinery

3. Raw materials

4. Staff/salaries, training

5. Start up costs before profit

6. Distribution

7. Marketing

1. Vision of the newspaper: Not a missionary or charity, but a business.

2. Complex business organizations: several departments but only one department deals with news. Manager: Publisher, background in business.

3. Costs: capital investment, cost of doing business (salaries, paper, telegraph news)

4. Business strategies in newspapers

• Keep Operating Costs Low (low pay, space pay, young reporters, quotas; result: falsity, fabrication. John Fox, H.L. Mencken)
• Predictable product/standardization. Creating news (Nelly Bly of the New York World), beats.
• Marketing: scoops, size of paper
• Trade associations/mutual aid associations. Uniform ad rates, fighting competition, lobbying.

Luring Advertisers

Large circulation, Demographic concerns (up-scale readers), family, women, niche. Articles about business

Luring Readings

Diversified content ("Omnibus press"); content for women, de-emphasis on politics; politics as a function of economic support system (one newspaper towns versus 2 newspaper towns); contests and prizes.

Other overheads related to Shaping and Packaging the News:

Topic Readership

Politics/general 25 per cent

Proceedings of Congress 10 per cent

Crime 95 per cent

Society 40 per cent

Fashion 40 per cent

Sports 60 per cent

Religion 15 per cent

Weather 75 per cent

Accidents 60 per cent

Business 35 per cent

Comics 95 per cent

1. First U.S. national newspaper chain.

United Press (telegraph news service)

Newspaper Enterprise Assn. (news features)

Science Service

40 newspapers

2. Philosophy

Information vital to democracy. Existing press biased toward upper classes. Scripps’ goal: news for the "forgotten" people ("Mr. and Mrs. Common People")

Business philosophy: Make a profit (15 per cent).

3. Major goals

Newspapers for the workers.

Profitable newspapers

Independent newspapers

4. Newspapers for the workers

Market analysis

Profile of the reader

Content: Issues addressing workers’ concerns (work place safety, hours, pay, cost of living, collective bargaining, unions)

Style of presentation: emphasis on interesting content, entertainment, vivid headlines, humor, news features, short news, photos and graphics.

5. Profitable newspapers

(a) Limit capital expenditures, operating expenses (four-page papers, small staffs, low pay, cheap offices, used equipment, heavy reliance on news services -- non local news)

(b) Avoid competition (seeking new readers, new advertisers ---- a "Still Hunt")

6. Independent newspapers

Limit reliance on advertisers (limit size of ads, amount of ads. No reading notices, no "dirty" ads.). Goal: many small advertisers, no large (e.g., department stores) advertisers.